A Blog by Ann Yeong (2005 – )
Easter is often a time when churches welcome Catholics who have been away from church home. In fact, you may even have been encouraged to invite someone you know who has been away from church back to mass this Easter. But do you know the deeper reasons WHY you are doing it? Each person has […]
I was never taught that if I were to enter a personal relationship with God, that I would be perpetually stretched to rediscover God again and again, or that my experience of God would keep expanding and breaking every mould I knew that could help me understand who “God” is. But that has been my […]
A little over 15 years ago, I went through an intense spiritual conversion in daily life. It didn’t take place at a retreat, nor was it facilitated by anyone. Over a period of 7 incredibly spiritually intense days that began with a sacrament of reconciliation and an unburdening of unforgiveness (of myself) of over 9 […]
Recently a dear friend shared with me how the mere thought of Lent and our traditional Lenten practices made her whole body contract. An interesting discussion about the intersection of trauma, family of origin wounds, religion, church and ascetic practices ensued which later made me recall my own personal struggles with Lent and how things changed for […]
That is why, even after the good advice and counsel of many, I can still say with Dante, “In the middle of the way of our life I find myself in a dark wood.” This experience is frightful as well as exhilarating because it is the great experience of being alone, alone in the world, […]
Do we really believe that we are not OBLIGED to obey God? That God never forces our assent? That God doesn’t withdraw his love from us when our response to him is “no”? Intellectually, I always knew that I was not obliged to ever say “yes” to God. But it was only when I had slowly […]
There is a very young part inside me whose emotion I don’t feel often. But when this specific part of me surges up into my consciousness, the power of her emotions breaks me. I have been reparenting my inner child for 10 years now. Since I also started integrating parts work (e.g. IFS Internal Family […]
There has been a truth that I have avoided, denied and suppressed my whole Catholic life until recently – I feel most distant from God during Holy Week, and especially on Good Friday. This is my sharing as a self-professed “recovering pharisee”. I have always been concerned about what I should understand and believe about […]
This reflection first appeared in my Begin Again monthly newsletter for September 2022. When it comes to our interior journey into authenticity and wholeness, we all begin with unrealistic expectations. I mean that everyone tends to think that the journey can be made relatively quickly so that we can carry on with our lives as […]
Many want wholeness but don’t want to wait. But what if wholeness only comes to those who have learned to wait? And what if waiting is not passive but includes the most full-hearted surrender of ourselves that we can possibly imagine? What if it means putting ourselves out on the line, but at the same […]
Journey of the Heart 